


tactical meld

by penhaligon



Series: Watcher Kit [13]
Category: Pillars of Eternity
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:48:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24744868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/penhaligon/pseuds/penhaligon
Summary: The Watcher has her own reasons for traveling to Kazuwari.
Series: Watcher Kit [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1271783
Comments: 24
Kudos: 7





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A little post-Deadfire adventure, because replaying Seeker Slayer Survivor gave me an idea for having Kit and her mentor (finally) interact. SSS can be set after Deadfire if I say that it can. This references some other fics, some ideas that I have for companion quest/ending rewrites, and some established relationship shenanigans, but none of it is of particular focus beyond Kit having developed her own canon at this point, lol.

_**Tactical Meld:** Connects the mind of the cipher with an ally to gain the ally's knowledge of his or her enemy._

* * *

The mess hall rumbled with voices, saturated in the smell of meat cooked in a dozen different ways. The six of them -- now four -- sat at one of the long tables that lined the side of the hall, with two spaces empty. Kit and Konstanten had gone to talk to the caretaker, and even though they were officially deemed contenders now, with every right to walk the halls of the temple without getting accosted, Edér wasn't keen on anyone leaving the sight of their so-called pack. Not least because Aloth had been acting a little squirrelly lately, more so than usual, and Kit seemed a bit more stressed than was typical.

"You good?" Edér asked, while Aloth frowned and picked at his food.

Aloth's expression visibly smoothed. "I'm not fond of the noise," he explained, wrinkling his nose.

And Edér had to give him credit: it sounded convincing enough, for someone who wasn't too good at lying. It might have satisfied Edér, had he not been paying attention over the past several days. "Uh-huh," Edér said. "That why you and Kit have been doing that thing where it looks like you're doing a lot of talking without words? Because I'm pretty sure you don't know how to do that." It was one thing if Kit and Ydwin got to sharing looks like that, and it could mean anything. But Aloth was no cipher, which meant that something was up.

The attention of the others around the table had been caught now, and Aloth fidgeted under the scrutiny of three pairs of eyes.

"What's wrong?" Xoti asked, curious.

"Hmm," Fassina said, unsurprised. "The casità is up to something, no?"

Aloth looked rather like a cornered animal as he scowled. "It's not for me to share," he said, "and it's nothing we need to be concerned about. She's merely seeking information. If you want to know more than that, ask her yourself."

So it was a Watcher problem, and Aloth was aware of it. And a Watcher problem, well... that could be anything.

But it wasn't like Kit to hide things. At least, not from Edér. A long time ago, maybe, but not anymore, so Edér was wondering now, and he wouldn't be able to stop. It didn't help that Kit and Konstanten had been gone for quite some time, and Edér didn't entirely trust the denizens of the arena to respect their status as contenders.

And so it wasn't long before Edér pushed himself to his feet. "I'm gonna get some air," he said, which was about as convincing as Aloth usually was.

"I don't think it's a good idea go traipsing about by yourself," Xoti said in concern, half-rising from her seat.

Edér waved her aside. "I'll be alright. Not a long walk to the barracks."

Which wasn't where he was going, but he left the mess hall quickly enough that no one had time to voice more protest, and he made his way into the rest of the Temple of Toamowhai.

* * *

The Crucible quivered with voices rising in anticipation, and Kit felt the press of emotion, the ebb and flow of excitement and hunger and happiness and anger and passion. She let it roll over her, background sensation that was easily tuned out, as she observed the arena below, and she took note of how the arrangement of the battlefield had changed for the upcoming fight between whatever contenders or souls were due next. That was what she and Konstanten were here for, nominally: to get a lay of the land from up top.

The important thing was that she could feel no familiar trace of soul energy up and down the length of the spectator stands, and nor had she felt any when they'd been down in the arena below. Nothing at all, no matter how far and hard Kit had cast her senses out, over and over again, since they'd arrived.

Maybe Dherys truly hadn't been here, and Kit's hunch was wrong. Maybe her mentor didn't care enough to seek out a stronghold of Galawain's.

Or maybe she was just good at hiding her tracks.

As they came to a stop to observe the arena below, Konstanten's unease was a discordant thread amid the swell of anticipation all around, and it wasn't entirely wrapped up in his reluctance to be here. Kit wasn't surprised when he finally cocked his head up at her, decision settling into his shoulders.

"Look," Konstanten said, pitching his voice just enough to be heard above the murmured din around them, "I'm not too keen on being back. But here I am, because you wanted to come, and I didn't want to let you walk into this place without me to watch your back. So I think I deserve some honesty." He paused, as if expecting resistance, but when Kit said nothing, he hurried on. "I know you're not here because you care about whatever's wrong with the souls here. Well," he amended, "maybe you care a little, because soul stuff is your thing, but there's something else going on. I can tell. Aloth's been twitching like he's got lice."

Kit sighed, a long, resigned thing. It had been too much to hope that Konstanten would let her earlier behavior pass by without comment. She wasn't even sure why she'd asked to speak to Humaire alone. There was no reason why Konstanten couldn't know, why the rest of the party couldn't know, except that Kit's skin itched with unease of her own, an unbearable thing that made her want to hold the entire world at a distance. But she was too tired to argue. "You're right."

Konstanten blinked in surprise. He hesitated, then folded his arms, like he wasn't quite sure how to respond to something that wasn't the disagreement he'd clearly braced himself for. "So what about that talk with Humaire was so important that it needed to be behind closed doors?"

"I'm... looking for someone," Kit said, and the words didn't come easily. It had always been a long shot, and it felt foolish now. "She's, ah... the woman who raised me. I think... she's got a bone to pick with Galawain, so when I heard that there was something wrong with an island of his..."

"You thought she might have passed through," Konstanten finished, somewhere between understanding and further confusion.

Kit nodded. "She's powerful. I think she'd be capable of something like that." Most of the others thought that whatever was wrong here was a symptom of the Wheel's destruction, but Kit wasn't so sure. Muātu and Humaire had both insisted that it had started before, and this island didn't feel like the gaping wound on Ukaizo, like the still and empty adra veins. It felt... abuzz. Discontent.

Konstanten considered this. It didn't make him look any more enthused about being here. "I get it now," he said. "Was wondering why you wanted this to be your last stop in the Deadfire. Kazuwari's not exactly a vacation, you know?" He eyed Kit curiously and ventured, "You and her don't get along?"

"Not even a little," Kit said. It was so much more than that, but it wasn't something she could voice.

"Why do you want to find her?" Konstanten asked, getting right to the heart of it.

Kit pressed her lips together tightly as she stared down at the arena. Konstanten wanted honesty, but at the end of the day, Kit didn't even know what the truth of it was. She wouldn't, she thought, until she saw her mentor again. "She's... been studying the Wheel a lot longer than I have. I need her expertise. Or..." Kit frowned down at the flooded arena below, at the contenders now entering. Only some of them would emerge again, and maybe Kit would have to face them, sooner or later. It made her want to turn away. "... I might just want to kill her. I'm not sure yet."

Konstanten leveled a long look at her, then heaved a great sigh of his own. "Well," he said, "I know a thing or two about leaving, and my advice? Would be not to look back, ever. But I think you and I see things a little differently." Kit almost went to apologize, though she wasn't sure what for, but Konstanten only huffed out a dry laugh. "Even if she didn't pass through, she's gotta be somewhere, right? We'll find her." The _we_ made something in Kit's chest constrict, as Konstanten continued, blithely unaware of the catch in Kit's throat. "Me, personally, I'd like the Wheel to be up and running again before I die, because I don't even want to know what'll happen if it isn't. So if you're gonna kill her, at least get some useful stuff out of her first."

Kit laughed, then, only a little bit emotional, and Konstanten gave her a faint grin, and they turned away before the fight could begin, heading back down the stairs to find their pack.

* * *

The damp stone of the temple's interior was lit with dim orange light, and it was cooler and quieter within, though the rumble of the mess and the Crucible reverberated like a distant roll of thunder, even over the roaring of water. Edér followed the curving path, making his way towards the Hall of Memories, and his footsteps were muffled by the rushing of the waterfalls. Their cool mist cleared his head somewhat, but when he reached the Hall, Kit and Konstanten weren't there, and no one within could tell him where they'd gone.

Edér tried not to feel anxious about that, but he picked up the pace as he left the Hall, pushing past a group of kith to whom he paid no mind as he took a quick glance into one of the antechambers that led up to the arena proper. But it was empty, and as he turned to trace his footsteps back the way he'd come, his mind jumping ahead to the spectator stalls, a voice caught his attention.

"Competition, huh?"

Edér paused, tension straightening his shoulders as he took in the sight of the group he'd come upon, clustered near the railing. Five kith, which meant another "pack," and the voice belonged to the wood elf woman at their center. She had white-blonde hair pulled into a bun, and a lazy smile on her face, and she leaned against the railing and looked at Edér like he was meat from the arena kitchen. A nature godlike woman stood at her side, tall and taller still for her imposing antlers. The aumaua man near them was nearly as tall, red and looming, and then two folk, one dark like Fassina and one paler than Edér. All appeared to be some variation on druid or wizard or fighter, if their array of weaponry was any indication, and none of them looked nice.

He probably should have listened to Xoti.

"Maybe so," Edér said, shifting so that his back was to the stone wall and his feet were planted evenly. He'd go for the grimoires first, if he had to, because the odds would need to be evened, and that was the risk of channeling power through an object: if it got tipped over into the water below, there was no getting it back quickly. He didn't _think_ fighting between contenders was allowed between actual matches, but he didn't like the look in the eyes around him. "No hard feelings, though, right?"

"None at all," the woman said, pushing off of the railing and standing tall. Her smile was more like the snarl of a predator, and her jewelry was an incongruous sight between otherwise practical gear. The glittering stones at her neck and ears and wrists were adra, Edér realized, wrapped up in delicate copper. He saw the like every day, and cold prickled up his spine as the woman spoke. He'd avoid her, if need be. Something about her told him that he might just lose the fight before it had even begun, if he got too close. "I just like to see what I'm up against."

"Hope you're not too disappointed," Edér said amiably, but when he tried to sidle left, he found the aumaua man in the way. Edér shifted back, just out of the man's range, teeth grinding together as he tried to keep an eye on the position of every weapon near him. The pale folk woman was somewhere at his right, where she hadn't been a moment before. "And I don't think this is necessary. Or legal."

"Easy, Ezka," the elf said, and the aumaua stepped back, leaving just enough room for Edér to pass. But Edér didn't move. "This is a friendly talk." It was the woman's turn to move, taking a step that brought her just within range, and Edér fought down the urge to yield ground. It felt like the smarter move, but he would only find stone wall against his back. The Hall of Memories wasn't far, he knew, even though he didn't take his eyes off of the woman. If this got ugly, if he called out, maybe someone would hear him. "It's not every day I meet someone like you."

Edér blinked. "Me?"

"You travel with the Watcher of Caed Nua, don't you?" the woman asked. "What do they call her now? The Herald of Berath?"

The question put Edér on the defensive more so than the fact that he was outnumbered. It wasn't uncommon to be recognized nowadays, but that happened to Kit more than him, and there was something else behind the question, he thought. The woman was fishing for something, and he wasn't going to give it to her, especially when it involved Kit. "Sure do," was all he said, clipped and flat, because there was no point in lying if she knew him by face. "And I've gotta go, so..."

The woman stepped forward in one smooth motion, far too close, and Edér froze when he found his sword half-drawn and the woman's hand against his wrist with just enough force to constitute warning. His vision swam for a second, and he couldn't quite recall going for his sword, only that he'd felt the need to give her a little warning himself the moment she'd moved. The past few seconds were hazy, like he'd blacked out momentarily, and his insides flip-flopped with her sudden proximity. He was a little taller than her, but it didn't matter, when it came to the desire to shrink away. Had she done something to him?

"Tell her the competition looks forward to seeing her," the woman said, her unfriendly smile pulling tight, and then she stepped back and turned away from Edér, abrupt and dismissive, as if he no longer interested her. The other kith similarly withdrew, following her lead.

Edér stood there, wrestling with the urge the start an ill-advised fight anyway, because it was one thing to threaten him and another thing to threaten Kit. But he gritted his teeth, settled his sword back into its sheath, and hurried back down the length of the arena's lower level.

He half-expected one of them to go for him when his back was turned, and he strained to hear the slightest indication behind him, but nothing followed in his wake.

To his relief, he saw Kit and Konstanten emerging from the steps that led up to the spectator stalls, but his relief only lasted for a moment. As he neared the stairs and as Kit caught sight of him, something throbbed in Edér's head, a pulse of sickening vertigo and narrowing vision, and he recognized it at once.

He and Kit had practiced, in those years after Sun in Shadow and before Eothas had come calling. What Edér had really wanted, in the end, was for her to understand that he wouldn't blink at the worst of her powers, and what she'd wanted was for him to be able to resist a cipher's grasp.

And so he punched through, clawing his way past the metaphysical darkness encroaching on either side of him, because Kit had taught him how. It was only a momentary thing, because it felt different from the kind of cipher powers that he was used to, stronger and stranger, and he didn't know what it was, and it _hurt_ , but it was enough for him to stumble back and hold up a warning hand, even as his other clutched at his head.

"Don't," he gasped out, and an awful, twisting pain throbbed through his skull again and made his eyes water. It was centered on Kit, whose eyes had flown wide and panicked, and Edér couldn't -- _wouldn't_ \-- let whatever this was push him to hurt her. He saw Kit hurrying forward, and he saw, flashing in and out of his awareness, rows of massive trees that were nothing like the ones on Kazuwari, dwellings strung high between them. He couldn't make sense of it. "Don't... don't get close, don't--"

Kit didn't listen, of course, but nothing surged to overtake Edér's mind and movements as she ran up to him. His awareness retreated into a hollow, frightened corner of his mind, and when it flooded out again, slamming him back into his own head and his own body, nothing had really changed, except that he was collapsed into a heap on the ground, and Kit was holding him up with Konstanten's help.

"Hey," Kit said, calm and shaky like a tide of rage lurked just beneath the surface, "look at me." Edér lifted his head and blinked, trying to focus on her face hovering close, and he must have succeeded, because Kit let loose a tense breath. "Okay. It's gone. It's-- you're fine." Her words were belied by how tightly she clutched at him, by the shaking of her fingers, by the sick color of her face.

"What's your name?" Konstanten asked anyway, like it was a question he'd asked many a time before. Edér let go of Kit and steadied himself against the ground and made no move to get to his feet, and Konstanten's hand remained on his shoulder.

Edér waved him away halfheartedly. "I know my name," he said. "I'm alright." He took a moment to breathe in and out, making sure that he felt like himself, that nothing intrusive in his mind strained towards Kit. But the throbbing was only a memory now, and he felt no different, except for a lingering dizziness. " _What_ was that?"

For a moment, it was like Kit couldn't speak at all, but she braced herself and physically swallowed, like that tide was about to come spilling out. "Nothing dangerous," she said, and she couldn't hide the way the words shook. "It was... I don't know, a... calling card?" Her face grew dark, a ripple of anger that Edér felt shudder through him too, stirring phantom emotions like a limb he hadn't been aware of until now, making his insides curl with alien temper and his nose fill with the scent of burning candles. "A bit of... memory, that would only wake up near me. So that I could recognize it."

Edér's mind was trying to connect the pieces into a whole that lay just beyond reach, but he was too rattled to catch up. All he said, slow and shaken, was, "I ran into someone. I, uh, I think she knew you."

A look passed between Kit and Konstanten, one that Edér was equally slow to follow. "I didn't think she'd be here _now_ ," Kit said, anger and panic and resignation flowing out of her like the waterfalls nearby, a breath or two away from drowning Edér in the deluge.

"Not too late to withdraw," Konstanten said, with the air of someone who knew his advice would go unheeded. Edér knew, instinctive, that Kit wouldn't listen to that either, even though his disconcerted thoughts were sluggish on the uptake.

Before Edér could follow the slowly building realization to its inevitable crest, they were interrupted by an arena warden, who wandered over and asked, "Everything okay?" with no small amount of suspicion.

Kit turned on the warden, her eyes flashing as she glared up at him. "Go away," she snapped, her voice resonating with compulsion and power, and the warden simply had no choice but to wander back the way he'd come.

It wasn't like her, and Edér stared. So did Konstanten. And at last, Edér's spinning head settled enough to think, as if his surprise knocked his thoughts back into order. His eyes landed on the pendant that hung from Kit's neck, on the adra encased in a circular copper apparatus, on the glow pulled out of it by the sheer force of Kit's roiling emotions. "Your mentor taught you how to make that, didn't she?" he asked quietly, realization and memory sinking heavy into his stomach.

Kit nodded miserably.

"Well," Edér said, "shit."

* * *

Kit stormed out of the barracks in a whirlwind of fury that buffeted against Aloth in waves, as he trailed behind her and offered another hasty apology to a surprised Domenga. With Kit's fury came impressions of something _else_ , like light breaking through in infinitesimal cracks, radiant and burning enough that Aloth felt it mingled with the emotions that weren't his. That was concerning, but it was a pattern that had persisted since they'd sailed to Magran's Teeth, and it wasn't out of control yet. It might very well get to that point, however, if Kit didn't get a handle on the fear that lay beneath the fury.

She'd never actually had a chance to test the alterations she'd made to her pendant, which could -- theoretically -- siphon away whatever excess Kit now carried from the god of light. But hopefully, it wouldn't get to the point where it needed to be tested.

Aloth didn't call out or attempt to reason with Kit. He merely stopped next to one of the exterior pools, where they would not be easily overheard past the cascade of the waterfall.

Even in the depths of her upset, Kit noticed at once. She came to a halt and turned on her heel to face him expectantly, but Aloth could see, could _feel_ , that her mind was elsewhere and hungry for blood. He'd often wondered what it was like, for her to walk around and feel so much around her that wasn't hers, in every waking hour and sometimes in her sleep. But every time he experienced a fraction of it, when Kit's control slipped like this, it made him grateful that he'd chosen an arcane path. That his Awakening hadn't also opened his eyes to a deeper sense of the world.

But it wasn't often that he felt it from her like this.

"Kit," Aloth said, calm and patient, "you need to breathe."

"I am breathing," Kit said, mulish, fists clenched so tightly at her sides that she was no doubt leaving marks in her skin.

"You're panicking," Aloth said, and he was ready for her instinctive denial, carrying on as she opened her mouth to retort. He understood, he really did. As much as he could, at least. It was why he'd offered to help her search for information here, even when she'd been cagey about it, even when he thought it was a matter best left alone. "I would be too, in your situation. But you need to slow down and think. If she wanted Edér dead, he would be already. _I_ would be already."

"She's toying with me," Kit said, but her face grew a shade more sickly at Aloth's words, as if voicing them aloud gave shape to a potential reality that she had not wanted to think about.

Aloth took a steadying breath, and it was difficult to remember that the mounting anxiety in his chest wasn't his. It was bleeding out of Kit like an open wound, like all of her fine control had evaporated, and Aloth didn't wish to see Humaire caught in the initial blast of Kit's reactionary fear. "I have no doubt that she is," he agreed. "But I don't believe she intends to harm us. I admit, I only met her briefly, but I was under the impression that there were certain lines that she didn't wish to cross. Now, whether that is because she is scared of what you can do, or because she wants to salvage what she can of your relationship, I don't know. But it _is_ something you can use."

Another presence cut through the foreign sense of anxiety, bringing a sense of pressure relieved and holding fear at bay in a way that Aloth himself had never been quite able to. "Aye, lass," Iselmyr said, the words of another uncommonly gentle as they left Aloth's mouth. "Listen to 'im."

Kit sucked in a trembling breath, and when her knees buckled, Aloth and Iselmyr both reached out reflexively. But Kit only put her back to the pool and leaned against the railing and sank down, and Aloth crouched beside her. There weren't many others present in the long hall that wound around the arena's lower level, and no one seemed to notice them at all. Aloth wondered if it was a purposeful concealment on Kit's part, which meant a slightly better state of mind, if she was thinking that clearly.

"You're right," Kit said, rubbing hard at the space between her eyes. "I'm sorry, I'm just..."

"... Reacting like a perfectly normal person," Aloth finished. It was usually Kit in his position, talking him through doubts and worries, and he didn't mind the change. He felt less and less of the intrusive fear and fury squeezing at his chest like an invading hand, which meant that Kit was regaining some level of control. It didn't mean that she was feeling better, but it was a start. "And that is heartening. I'm glad to see that you still _are_ a normal person, even after everything. You have me wondering, sometimes."

Kit exhaled hard, and it was almost a laugh. But it faded fast, and she scowled down at the ground for a long while. Aloth remained silent, waiting, listening to the crash of water and the hum of voices. Even Iselmyr didn't thrum with her typical impatience, only sank back into slumber when it was clear that Kit was growing calmer and calmer

"I don't think Humaire knows," Kit said finally, her voice quiet and a little steadier. "She wasn't lying."

Aloth allowed himself to relax somewhat as well. There was the Kit he knew. "I had the same thought."

"But I still need to talk to her," Kit continued, straightening, some of her usual pragmatism settling back into her voice, "and figure out what... what my mentor did and why. She's obviously a contender, but she's hiding her trail? Why?"

For that, Aloth had no answers or guesses, but he offered her a hand, and Kit's fingers shook ever so slightly as she took it. Her grip, however, was tight and warm and grateful, as he pulled her to her feet. "We can start," Aloth said, "by asking."

* * *

"I've never seen the Watcher so angry," Xoti said. Her fingers, wreathed in gold light, were pressed against Edér's temples, but still, he felt no different. Xoti didn't appear to find anything of concern, either, because it was only a few moments before the light faded. She placed her hands on her hips. "Hel, I've never _felt_ it like that. I was fixing to kill someone myself, for a second."

Even though Kit had claimed that there was nothing dangerous about whatever her mentor had done to Edér, she had still insisted that Xoti check on him. She had also ordered them to stay together, tucked away in their dim little room in the barracks, and then she'd marched right back to Humaire, this time with Aloth in tow. The caretaker had apparently claimed no knowledge, when Kit had gone asking after any news or sight of her mentor, and Edér didn't think she'd _kill_ Humaire for it, but Kit was looking for something to throw her frustrations at. Aloth would be able to head it off, though.

"She is not prone to such loss of control," Fassina observed. She sat on the edge of the bed across from Edér's with her grimoire open in her lap, the book all but forgotten as she scrutinized Edér. Konstanten lay sprawled out on the bed behind her, frowning up at the bottom of the bunk bed above. "This woman you met, what do you know of her?"

"... She's Glanfathan," Edér said, carefully. They needed to know the facts, if Kit's mentor was here and was a threat, but the rest was for Kit to share, if she wanted. "She raised Kit. Taught her." One of Fassina's eyebrows arched, and Edér was in agreement. It didn't bode well, for the kind of power level they were dealing with. "She's a cipher. A scary one. I think she's a contender too, so she's got those friends with her." What had Kit called them? "Resonants."

Fassina's brows drew together. "Hmph," she said. "I am beginning to think we should have brought more than one second." The arena only allowed five contenders to a pack, but Kit had brought Aloth along to serve as backup, just in case. Considering that Aloth hadn't looked all that surprised at the news that Kit's mentor was here, Edér got the feeling that Kit had wanted him to come along for a different reason.

"I say we ship off and leave this place behind for good," Konstanten said to the ceiling.

"Oh, the casità will not go for that," Fassina said confidently, reaching back to pat absently at Konstanten's leg, and he sighed his agreement.

"I'll say," Xoti said, flopping down on the bed next to Edér. "But we've faced worse before. Right?" Her voice rose with uncertainty.

Edér flexed his fingers absently, as if to remind himself that they were his to move. "Sure," he said. "Still, wouldn't hurt to send word back to the ship." Kit had left Ydwin in command, and Rekke and Vatnir and Serafen behind, to provide some measure of protection for Vela and for a certain sword that now held a slumbering piece of a god, just in case. Edér had never imagined that he'd _want_ the sword here, but he had to admit, he'd feel better if he knew that Eothas was watching Kit's back.

But Kit had been adamant that she wouldn't bring the sword to any place where Galawain or another god might be made aware of the presence within it. That was reasonable, Edér supposed. They didn't need the Father of Monsters trying to kill them even more than he apparently already was.

All things considered, between Galawain and the island and now Kit's mentor, some more allies on their side wouldn't hurt. Even though they were down by a few, with Pallegina back to the Wayfarers, and Maia trying to bring reform back to Rauatai, and Tekēhu caught up in the whirlwind of Huana activity in the wake of Ukaizo. Edér figured that Pallegina would come running with Wayfarers in tow if he said that the situation was dire enough, but he might have also been straying into overreacting, now.

It came down to the fact that he just didn't know what Kit's mentor _wanted_.

When Kit and Aloth returned, Kit looked wobbly on her feet, so much that Fassina jumped up and herded Kit into sitting, and Konstanten only half-jokingly offered to give her a massage, and Xoti flailed about for a minute, determined to be useful. But Kit only shook her head and sat heavily on the bed, with Fassina and Konstanten on either side of her, and Edér and Xoti across, and Aloth leaning against the bed frame.

"Humaire didn't remember... meeting Dherys," Kit said, only just managing not to stumble over her mentor's name. "Her memories had been... altered. I didn't even _think_ to check before."

"Most people wouldn't," Edér said.

Kit gave him that look that she always did when he elbowed in front of her nonsense, but she sagged a moment later, dropping her head into her hands. "I don't know what she wants," Kit said, which wasn't exactly reassuring. She rubbed at her forehead like a headache was growing. "But Aloth made a good point. I don't think she's out to get us... to get me. I think she wants something from Galawain, and she's angry that I left, and she just saw an opportunity to... to get back at me."

Her voice was low and hard, but Edér heard the trembling behind it, and it made him sick. Sick that he'd been used for that, that it had left Kit so drained and angry and exhausted. His voice was equally hard when he spoke. "We'll be seeing her in the arena, yeah?"

"Leave her to me," Kit said sternly, as she dropped her hands. It would be the smart thing to do, but Edér wasn't feeling particularly inclined towards that sort of thing. Kit had suffered enough at her mentor's hands. Let someone else have a go, Edér thought, but another voice cut into his ruminations.

"Forgive me, casità," Fassina said, her voice softer than usual, "but if that is the woman who raised you, I must assume that she has also chosen the Seeking Face. Which means that we will encounter her very soon."

"Probably," Kit sighed, and she drew herself up, fists tightening in her lap, "but we're going to do what we came here to do, and I'll rip answers out of her if I have to."

Xoti's eyes were large and worried as she gazed at Kit. A question hung in the air, unspoken, and Xoti was the one who mustered up the courage to give it a voice. "Are you gonna kill her?"

It wasn't really silent, here in the Temple, with the eternal rumble of contender and guest alike. But for a moment, the silence was total and whole, as Kit's face shuttered into something entirely unreadable. "If I have to," she repeated, flat.

Edér didn't doubt that she could. He didn't doubt that she hated her mentor more and more with each passing day. But he knew how much lay unresolved still, and no matter how much he could still feel flashes of that anger leaking out of Kit here and there, it came down to whether she'd be able to bring herself to. Even in the arena, where it was expected, he wasn't so sure.

"Until then," Kit said, in an iron tone that suggested that any further questions would send her tipping over one edge or another, "no one goes anywhere alone. Aloth," she looked up at him, her worry not entirely hidden, "when we're in the arena, you won't have us around. So stay close, in range."

Aloth nodded, with a calm sort of confidence that he'd picked up somewhere between Defiance Bay and here. "You need not worry about me, Kit. In fact," Aloth's voice took on a suspiciously pleasant and neutral tone, an abrupt change that wasn't at all subtle, "your mentor and her friends are clearly not staying in the barracks, so I thought we could look into warding the area, provided that Domenga has no objections. Fassina, Xoti, if you will?"

Xoti hopped to her feet much too fast. "Right you are!" she said, artificially bright.

"Good thinking as always, aimico," Fassina said, only a little more smoothly, and she grasped Konstanten's shirt with one hand and hauled him up.

Konstanten spluttered, but offered no resistance. "What?! What do you need me for?"

"I like your company, postenago," Fassina said, with the air of someone very exhausted at having to explain such simple facts, and she tugged him out of the room. Xoti followed, grinning widely, and Aloth was the last to step out, shooting a small but sincere smile in Kit's direction.

Edér watched them go and shook his head, long and slow and unimpressed. "Good thing we're not an acting troupe."

Kit got to her feet. "Oh, we could probably find work in Dunnage," she said, and Edér smiled. He expected her to take a seat next to him, but instead she came to a stop in front of him and cupped either side of his face in her hands. She tilted his head up and fixed him with her sternest look, punctuating every few words deliberately. "Do not. Confront her. In the arena."

Edér sighed. It had a theatrical flair to it that definitely would have gotten him a job in Dunnage. "You never let me have any fun."

"I mean it," Kit said. No longer did her emotions pour off of her in waves that anyone around her could feel, but Edér didn't need that to know what lurked beneath the words. To feel it in the tightening of her fingers by the barest fraction.

"Alright," Edér said, and this time, his voice was serious. He tried not to let it crack around the knowledge of what she feared. That someone who raised her, who should have loved her, would hurt someone she loved. "I won't. Just go ahead and point me at whoever I need to take down. There was, uh," he made a show of thinking about it, another thing that would have landed him a role over in the Radiant Court, "some aumaua guy. Red, gave me stink eye. Nature godlike lady, taller than me, and that's saying something. And some folk too. One of 'em, I might've thought she was a pale elf if the ears had been right. The other one had dark skin, long hair."

Kit frowned as she considered it. She let go of Edér's face, and he immediately missed the warmth of her hands, but she took a seat next him and leaned against his shoulder, and that was just as good. "The godlike is Ascdala," she said. "She's a cipher too. Ezka is the aumaua. He's a druid. I'm not sure if I know the other two. But..." Kit's voice trailed away, her brows furrowing so much that it was a wonder she didn't give herself a headache with all of that thinking, "when we're in the arena... let me handle things first, okay? I think I know how it's going to go down. And if it doesn't... go for Ezka until I handle Dherys and Ascdala both. Then Ascdala is all yours."

Edér mulled over the words. They'd have to go over a plan in more detail with the others, if things didn't work out like Kit thought they might, but she clearly had a hunch about something. "You think she's not gonna want to fight you?"

"Not to the death," Kit said, more certain than he would have expected. "She's not here to earn Galawain's favor, I can tell you that. She's up to something. And... it's something Aloth said. I think he's right." She grimaced, then, and looked up at Edér, apology written across her face. "He only knew why I wanted to come here because... he guessed, before we even made port. He met her once, not too long before all of this."

Edér arched his eyebrows. "And he came out intact? Remind me to buy him a drink."

Kit's flash of humor was dark and fleeting. "I wasn't going to tell anyone what I was looking for," she said, her face falling, "because I thought she'd be long gone, if she came here at all. I didn't... I didn't want to commit to anything, I just... I wanted a trail to follow. And talking about it..." she took a deep breath, her voice turning wry for a moment, "would have made it real." She leaned more of her weight into his shoulder and looked away. "But I should have told you -- all of you -- from the beginning."

"You don't owe me that," Edér said. He knew what Kit had grown up with. He figured she was entitled to as many secrets as she wanted. "Long as it doesn't affect us, and you didn't know that it would." He fell silent for a moment, waiting, but Kit didn't argue. She really must have been tired. "Think we should send word back to the others?"

"I'll see about getting a message out," Kit said, and he saw more than felt her sudden spike of anxiety. "But I wanted Ydwin and Serafen there for a reason. _The Fulcrum_ 's as safe as it can be from this shit island. And we're..." she faltered, momentary and uncertain this time, "we're safe. I think."

Speculating on that wasn't good enough, Edér didn't say. The fact that Kit was worried at all, that even now she looked at him and at the rest of them with barely concealed distress... he wouldn't go after Dherys, as much as he wanted to. Kit was right, even if Edér wasn't very happy to admit it to himself. Her mentor could probably kick his ass without breaking a sweat. But Kit shouldn't have had to be afraid of that at all. She shouldn't have had to fear someone who should have cared for her.

Edér took her hand and squeezed it tight, and when Kit squeezed back, her grip was surprisingly steady.


	2. Chapter 2

It was times like these that Xoti missed Maia, and not just her for reassuring ability to eliminate a threat from a safe distance and be done with it, though that would surely come in handy right about now. It hadn't been all that long since they'd parted, but Xoti found herself missing everything: their talks, their jokes, and the little things, like how inconveniently and breathtakingly tall Maia was.

Kit thought they'd be swinging around to Rauatai eventually -- to most of the known world, probably -- and Xoti was already counting the days.

But Maia had a duty, even if it came to nothing in the end. She had a voice in the ranga's court, and maybe it would be heard, though from the way she'd talked around it before she left, she hadn't seemed too sure. But she'd said that she had to try, and it was another thing that Xoti loved about her.

Xoti had a duty too, beyond someone she missed dearly, and even beyond the Children of the Dawnstars. And so it was no trouble at all to corner the Watcher, when Kit was now reluctant to let them out of her sight for long.

Kit was resigned to their usual check-ups, but when Xoti made her stay behind and sit while the others went to breakfast, Kit offered no typical, "I'm fine," and that was more worrying than anything. Xoti had never seen her like this, never seen her _scared_ to the point that it had radiated from her in an overpowering aura. There was a lot that Xoti didn't know, but she could guess enough, given how Kit was particular about the use of her powers, and given how Edér hovered protectively near her and peeled himself from her side only reluctantly.

Xoti knew what it was like to grow up in turbulence, but it must have been something else entirely, to have the person responsible for it looming somewhere just out of sight.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, a little too bright.

Kit sat on the edge of one of the beds and lifted her head to give Xoti a _look_.

"Right," Xoti said, and she sat down across from Kit and offered a hand. Kit took it in one of her own, and the sense of her became that much stronger, when skin met skin. There was another sense too, faint but ever-present and so very familiar. It had radiated from Kit yesterday, but today it was back to its usual muted resonance, which was more than likely a good sign. Xoti probed at it and was conscious of warmth against her back, even though there was no sun within the depths of this temple. "Could you hear him at all, yesterday?"

Kit shook her head. "Still too far," she said. "But I haven't been able to build up the same range that I had with the Steward, either." She frowned. "I felt... something, though." She lifted her other hand, and her fingers curled around the pendant hanging from her neck. It was newly reconstructed and supposed to help, though that was still only a theory. "I don't know. I'm afraid I'm going to go... fucking avenging god on her the moment I see her." 

"I don't think you give yourself enough credit," Xoti said. She bit down on her lip, thinking, then asked, "Is it losing? What you're afraid of?"

She could see the kneejerk impulse to deny it, before Kit swallowed it back and nodded, which was a lot more honest than Xoti had expected.

"And you'd do anything not to, huh?" Xoti guessed.

She didn't need Kit's falling face or answering nod to know that she was right. To know that Kit was worried about the temptation of delving headlong into whatever gift or curse that Gaun had unintentionally given her, if it meant that any fight between her and her mentor came out in her favor.

Anger surged through Xoti, then, towards this mysterious woman who had the Watcher so nervous, because it wasn't _right_ , to see Kit like this. For Gaun's sake, she was the Watcher of Caed Nua! She talked to gods like it was her job. What was one kith to that? "Then go avenging god on her!" Xoti said hotly, her grip on Kit's hand tightening. Kit's eyes widened, but the frustration continued spilling out of Xoti in a rush. "I mean, Hel, Watcher, it's not like you're _possessed_. You're just... a little different now. And we're working on figuring it out, ain't we?"

It was why Xoti was here. Kit still carried the souls of the dead behind her, and she worked hard for the living, too. She was determined to seek out what lay at the heart of the Wheel -- the original Wheel -- and if there was anyone who could find it, who could pave the way to seeing it restored, it was her. But she would need every advantage she could get, if she kept pushing every boundary around her, and what was the point of mingling with the gods, if she shied away from what she could get out of it?

Kit gave her an exasperated look, her hand tightening around her pendant. "If I can't _turn it off_..." she began, a wealth of imagined horror stories contained within a few words.

"Then I'll knock you out," Xoti interrupted. "Even a bit of Gaun's no match for a good wallop."

It drew the shadow of a laugh out of Kit, tired and abrupt. "I don't think it's that simple."

"I think you overthink everything," Xoti said. It was occasionally exhausting to talk to the Watcher, that was for sure. "It worked out last time, didn't it? And if you keep going down this path, looking after souls and trying to fix the Wheel, you think this is the last hard fight you'll have?" Kit's face went blank, deliberately so, like she was trying not to think about it. But she _needed_ to think about it, and so Xoti kept pushing. "Like it or not, you've got _something_ of the gods in you now. It'd be better to start trying to control it, before it finds a way to control you. Especially if you're planning on breaking the rules down there," she added. "I don't think the Faces will like that very much."

Kit's mouth twisted into a thin line. "The arena's not exactly a controlled environment," she said, with far less conviction than usual, and her hand drifted down from her pendant to rest uncertainly in her lap. It wasn't an outright rejection. She must have been shaken something fierce, if she was caving into an opposing argument that quickly.

"It's more controlled than our boat," Xoti said frankly. "And I'll have your back. We all will. How's about a little trust?"

That took the wind out of Kit's sails. Her shoulders dropped, and she looked down at the floor. "She's already gone after Aloth," Kit muttered, "and Edér. I just-- I don't want any of you in _my_ crossfire."

"Kit," Xoti said, with only a little exasperation, even though it made something very warm indeed settle into her chest, beyond the familiar sense of radiance that lingered perpetually around Kit nowadays, "if we were worried about that, we wouldn't be following you around like a bunch of chicklings that lost their ma."

This time, Kit's laugh was full-bodied, as she extracted her hand from Xoti's and clasped her fingers together, like interlinking them would hold herself together. But her eyes were thoughtful, as she fell silent and appeared to seriously consider the words. "... I'll think about it," Kit said finally, "okay?"

"Okay," Xoti said, because that was as good of an answer as she'd get right now. She didn't say that it was all too likely that the divine essence within Kit would come surging forth no matter what, in the arena. Kit knew that already. Xoti just couldn't shake the sense that being afraid of it and fighting it would only make it worse, would only drown her in it. There was an ebb and flow to everything -- to life and death, to essence, to change -- and resisting it was like trying to swim against a tide. "And we'll be right behind you."

Kit smiled at her, soft and grateful and nervous all at once. It was the kind of look that would have made Xoti weak in the knees, a while back. Now, she was just happy to put it on Kit's face, if it meant calming a little more of that vortex of emotion that had blasted out of her yesterday, that no longer radiated from her but was no doubt still raging somewhere private and hidden.

There was no walking back the changes that had happened to Kit, to the world. There was only moving forward with them. But Kit knew that too. She was just scared, and it might have been the first time that Xoti had seen it so clearly. It made her wonder about the person who brought it to the surface so vividly, who cast such a pall over the Watcher.

And if it made Xoti a little bloodthirsty, well... they'd need that in the arena, after all, if things went south.

* * *

Fassina had been right. They saw no further glimpse of Dherys or other Resonants over the next few days, but when it came down to the final challenge that would win them the favor of the Seeking Face, Kit knew. She felt it, when she had not felt it before. Like a veil had been lifted or a film had been cleared, she recognized the signatures of souls whose presence she had not been in proximity to for a long time. Then, she had been barely an adult, knowing only that she needed to leave, to get away, knowing little of what it meant to navigate a world outside of the Living Lands.

Now, well...

The Crucible reached a fever pitch of rumbling anticipation when they emerged. Kit's eyes adjusted to the light, and she found that the arena lay unexpectedly open before her. She'd seen and fought other bouts between contenders, and the aim seemed to be to offer as little space as possible, by flooding half of the arena and leaving only narrow piers on which to fight. This time, however, the circular stone arena rose out of the water at its full depth and breadth, and it was bare, for the most part, except for the odd barricade here and there.

The spectators thundered, and the Seeking Face spoke, but Kit didn't hear them. Her attention narrowed to the other end of the arena, to the kith clustered there. To the woman who stood at their center, as if that was all that existed here in the Crucible.

Dherys didn't look very different. The same hair, the same scar, and a face that had hardly aged, bearing the same smug look that Kit longed to knock right off of her.

Kit was aware of the blood rushing in her ears, but it was as distant as the voice of the Seeking Face. As if a wealth of calm stood between her and her pounding heart, emotion and reaction curiously muffled. "Stay here," she said, her own voice just as far away. The arena, too, seemed to contain a great distance as she stepped forward, her pace slow and measured.

The other Resonants remained just as still as Kit's companions, as Dherys stepped forward too. If Kit had been paying attention, she would have heard the confusion that rippled through the arena. She would have seen the intensified glow of the Seeking Face's eyes, and heard its wondering, hungry silence. But every sense she had, sight and hearing and soul, strained towards the woman who approached across the arena, noting her every minute movement, anticipating anything.

Dherys felt the same, too, the outer shell of her soul charged in a way that only came about from a lifetime's worth of careful study and practice and then some. It roiled like a living thing bristling with impenetrable, chitinous thorns, colored in Kit's perception by a deep green that was almost black. It was a soul that was not easily delved into, a will that was not easily breached.

But Kit had gotten plenty of practice of her own, in the intervening years.

Dherys veered off, casually yanking her twin swords out of the sheaths strapped to her back as she took a path that gave her a wider berth around the arena. Kit veered similarly, so that they ended up circling around the arena's center. It was familiar, a pattern that Kit's feet fell into with hardly a spare thought. They'd spent years practicing together, all across the Lands. This arena was no different from a forest clearing, Kit thought, and Dherys seemed curiously unchanged.

The difference lay in Kit, now a Watcher, now Awakened, now full of knowledge and power that Dherys had only dreamed of.

Kit drew no weapon or shield. She only kept herself angled to face her mentor, watchful and cautious, and when something probed at her mind like the reach of long fingers, she batted them away. That was practiced and familiar, too. Absolute control over one's thoughts and will only came with long years spent learning.

"If you've got something to say to me," Kit said as she circled, and her voice was full of that odd, muffling calm, "you can say it out loud." With the probing came sensations and impressions that were not her own, those that Dherys allowed to slip out. Pieces formed into understanding that didn't need to be conveyed with spoken or silent words, and Kit rolled her eyes. "And this is a bit much."

Dherys shrugged. "I couldn't be sure you'd talk to me, otherwise," she said. Her voice was the same, too, caustic and resonant with certainty. "But you wouldn't back down from this. You don't give up. Well," she amended, giving Kit a long, sideways, sardonic look, "most of the time."

The others in the arena remained in Kit's sight at all times, the signature of their souls' energy locked into her cipher's senses when circling put them out of physical sight. None of the Resonants moved, and nothing suspect stirred within range of Kit's friends. But she didn't let her guard down. "Still upset that I left?"

"Believe it or not," Dherys said, dry, "my life does not revolve around you."

"Really?" Kit asked. "Because this," she gestured to the arena, to the spectators, to the Faces, "is an awful lot of effort to get my attention. You didn't mean to be noticed here before I showed up. How hard was it to catch up with the challenges? Must have been exhausting."

Dherys lazily twirled a sword. "You can tell yourself whatever you want," she said, and nothing of her true feelings escaped through the words, nothing for a cipher's ears to hear. Kit had learned control from the best. "Did you like my little surprise? Gave you quite a fright, I could tell. That colony isn't there anymore, did you know?"

For a moment, the blood rushed loud and hot in Kit's ears, but she took a surreptitious breath and kept her steps steady. "I'm sure that's your fault."

A wide, wolfish grin flitted across Dherys's face. "Maybe," she said. "But everything's my fault, isn't it?"

Kit should have asked what the purpose of this was. Why Dherys was here. Why she had inserted herself and her Resonants into the challenges, beyond an underhanded way to ensure that Kit was forced to confront her. What she planned to do about the fact that contenders were expected to kill each other. Instead, Kit said, "You lied to me. You _altered_ my memories." Again, something rushed furious beneath her skin, and she tightened the circle just a bit. So did Dherys, half a breath after. They were in close range of each other, but neither struck. "My parents didn't abandon me."

Dherys didn't look surprised. Had she always suspected that one day the knot of lies in Kit's mind would unravel? But even Dherys couldn't have accounted for the manner in which it had happened, the deception sheared clean through by a god's hand. "No," Dherys said, something bitter flashing through her expression. "They just wanted to take everything that you were away from you."

"Everything?" Kit tried to muster up disdain, even though something twisted in her gut with the words. The lie would not have been so successful, had it not been built upon a bedrock of truth. Her memories were still clouded, but the impression of whispered, overheard conversation remained clear enough. Conversation about her, about what was happening to her. "For fuck's sake, it's a discipline. Anyone can learn to do what we do."

"But not like you can," Dherys said, with an abrupt fervor that had Kit faltering for half a step. "The valleys, the adra, they gave you a gift. You could hear the resonance of living souls by the time you could talk, and your parents would have had me rip that out of you." It wasn't a lie. Kit could still hear it in the whispers: the fear. She had to swallow, as she stepped carefully and kept her eyes on her mentor. "They couldn't handle a child who was different."

It had been worse, so much worse, when Kit had been young, and Dherys had explained it when Kit had been old enough to understand: how the adra beneath the Living Lands was vast and sprawling and ripe with potent essence, how it shaped the very nature of the region and the nature of the people who inhabited it. Strange climates, strange growths, strange diseases, strange turns of behavior. Strange powers grafted into a young soul, opening metaphysical eyes and ears to the thrum of housed souls.

But what Kit remembered best was how overwhelming it had been for every other sense, until she'd learned to control it. How it had made her skin itch and her eyes hurt and her ears ache, how it had made her head throb with migraines so long and frequent that sometimes she dreaded going to sleep, for fear that she'd wake up in terrible pain. They'd whispered about that too.

"And _you_ could?" Kit demanded, unwanted memory making her voice hot and raw and loud, making the rest of the arena come back into focus for a moment in a rush of blazing sunlight.

"Oh, don't act like you're better than me," Dherys said, and then she smiled at Kit, like the baring of fangs. "You've got that little girl back on your ship, don't you?"

Kit's stomach swooped, as if she'd fallen from a very great height. The heat beneath her skin turned to ice, and her steps faltered again.

"You taught your boyfriend well, but not well enough," Dherys said, flippant, like she wasn't paying much attention to the pendant around Kit's neck, now writhing with light like Kit's thoughts were. "I saw plenty in his head. The Wheel, for one. I figured something like that must've happened, the way the adra's been lately. And you've got all kinds of interesting things in your life now, don't you? Not just the boyfriend." Dherys ticked them off with great curiosity. "A little girl, a fampyr, a _god_." If Kit's calm hadn't been slipping, if her focus hadn't been narrowing, tunneled by fury, she would have noticed that Dherys looked genuinely impressed. "And all those people following you all over this miserable island chain. I guess you do take after me." Dherys winked. "I look forward to meeting them."

The thin threads holding Kit's calm in place snapped, burning away into nothing like shadows in sunlight, and Dherys had only a moment to look alarmed before Kit lunged.

* * *

Konstanten had seen plenty of posturing before. Kazuwari wouldn't be Kazuwari without it, and Neketaka had its fair share of kith muscling for space and pires. But he hadn't seen it quite like this, because afterwards, he would never be able to recall the details of what had been said, and it only seemed to go on for the span of a minute or so, even though a part of him knew that it had been longer. Some freaky cipher thing at work, no doubt, and Konstanten would have been happy to leave them to it, if it meant that one or the other stepped down and threw the fight.

The Seeking Face wouldn't be happy about that, but forgoing a match was allowed up to the moment it started, and Konstanten had some choice words for where the Faces could shove their disappointment.

And then Kit launched herself at that mentor of hers, and time and awareness caught up to Konstanten at full tilt. The crowd above them roared in sudden, ravenous excitement, and he almost reacted on instinct, a breath away from hurling himself into the arena too, lest Kit fight alone. But Fassina's warning hand on his shoulder made him freeze.

"Do we step in now?" Fassina asked, sounding genuinely unsure.

"I wouldn't recommend it," Xoti said, far more confident.

"You don't think she's--?" Edér began and didn't finish.

As questions went, it had already answered itself. Even Konstanten could feel it, and he'd never fancied himself a mystical type. The air had changed, like a storm had come bearing lightning and the answering thunder. But the sky was clear and bright. The sun beat down upon the Crucible, and apparently, some of it had taken up residence in Kit too. She had her sword and shield in hand, but she hardly seemed to need them, as increasingly visible essence whirled around her like a typhoon, and Dherys actually retreated, stumbling back under the onslaught of something that wasn't visible.

The kith on the other side of the arena moved, and Edér twitched, as Xoti reached out to lay a hand on his arm. "Wait," she said. "Stay out of range, remember?"

Edér didn't look too happy about that. Konstanten wasn't, either, but neither did he want to get burned.

The other kith, the Resonants, only made it a few steps before a wave of force threw them back and left them sprawled, and Dherys took that opportunity to strike, shrugging off whatever Kit had done to her. Konstanten had to admit, the elf was a force of nature, because it wasn't often that he saw anyone resist what Kit could do. If it had been him faced with an enraged Watcher who smoldered with something that wasn't at all kith-like, he might have tried to throw himself on her mercy and hope for the best. Or else he would have just run for his life.

But Dherys threw herself forward like a striking snake, glowing with not inconsiderable power of her own, and the air of the arena shuddered as two willpowers met. Konstanten winced as whatever it was rolled over them and made his ears ache, and he saw similar flinches from the others.

Dherys was fighting to disarm. Konstanten could see that, not just from the way in which she wielded her twin blades, but from the aftereffects of her and Kit's powers that rippled throughout the arena. Admittedly, he didn't know much about ciphers, but he knew what it looked like when they got lethal, and this wasn't it. The woman was definitely powerful, but she moved at a disadvantage. She didn't want to hurt her protege, as Kit had suspected, and Kit, meanwhile, was a lot harder to get a read on from here.

Konstanten thought that she really might have been going for the kill. The nature godlike across the arena certainly seemed to think so, because she struggled to her feet and tried to stumble forward, staggering drunkenly. She managed to get close, too, coming at Kit's back, because Kit and Dherys had crossed blades, and it seemed that even Kit was having trouble getting past Dherys's defense, that mentor was still the better swordswoman than protege.

Edér twitched again, and Fassina gripped her grimoire reflexively, breathing out the beginning of a spell. But Kit changed tactics, so abrupt that it left even Konstanten a little dizzy to watch: sidestepping her mentor with a twist of her shield and spinning around to rush for the godlike. Dherys lunged too, a sudden panic in the movement, and Konstanten knew, then, that Kit had her.

Kit switched it up again, twisting around with another sidestep and a fierce thrust of hand and sword and essence, and one will overcame the other, and Dherys hit the ground. The godlike dropped a second later, as Kit executed a move she'd almost certainly learned from Edér and simply hurled her shield at the dizzied woman, and then Kit's sword was at Dherys's throat.

Dherys didn't try to get up. She didn't move at all. She wasn't out, but she seemed to realize what the wiser move was.

The arena was as bright as midday, even though they were well into the afternoon. Even from here, Konstanten could see that Kit breathed hard and fast, that her eyes weren't normal anymore, and he found himself gripped with a strong desire to retreat, as if enveloped in the fear aura of a dragon.

Slowly, Kit looked up at the great statue of the Faces of the Hunt, at the purple eyes of the Seeking Face gleaming high above her.

"She yields," Kit said, her voice ringing across the arena in a way that made the stone tremble and seemed to bend the very air to its will. It made Konstanten want to agree, and she wasn't even talking to him. "I win. If you want my help? Those are my terms."

There was no way, Konstanten thought. They both suspected that Humaire's search for a Watcher had not been entirely her own idea, but there was no way that any of the Faces would tolerate a battle started and ended without bloodshed.

The Seeking Face was silent for the span of a long, slow breath. "You are no Champion yet, Watcher," it rumbled, voice ringing like Kit's, eyes blazing. "But you seek your enemy's flaws and strengths and unravel both at their seams. You have proven that you are worthy to compete for my blessing. I accept your terms."

Well, Konstanten thought, as the stands above them erupted in all kinds of frenzied emotion. They clearly wanted something.

"Now we step in," Xoti said, her earlier confidence replaced by a thinly disguised worry, and Konstanten resisted the urge to sigh. They'd talked about this, before the battle. About the possibility of Kit using whatever abilities she'd picked up from tangling with Eothas. So far, it appeared to amount to a near endless reserve of what she called focus. Except that Konstanten had heard the story from Serafen, about what had gone down in the bowels of Crookspur, and he'd seen some of it during the initial attack on the fort. He'd seen how wiped Kit had been after, too, like a hangover that took days to clear.

He was wary of it, like any sensible kith. And Kit was wary of it too, so much that she'd worked ceaselessly to turn that necklace of hers into some kind of safeguard. But she'd been strangely noncommittal, during their discussion. Not vehement, like she usually was, about not relying on it as an advantage.

Konstanten didn't know if it was Kazuwari or the presence of her mentor getting to Kit, or both, but his opinion hadn't changed: they needed to spend as little time here as possible. He'd felt it himself, to his dismay. An odd sort of gratification, when they'd stepped into the arena in the matches before this. A longing that wasn't quite buried, for the cheers above and for the booming acknowledgement of the Faces. Even if it meant spilling blood.

He trailed behind by a few paces as they hurried forward across the too-bright arena, as Kit stepped back from her mentor and sheathed her sword. Her movements were slow and not quite smooth, and Konstanten didn't need to see her face to feel the hatred that radiated from her, not abated by the fact that her mentor was at her mercy. It only trickled away when they neared, as Dherys slowly pushed herself up into a sitting position, looking downright shocked.

Kit turned to face them, and Edér, with all of the bullheaded recklessness that Konstanten didn't know whether to find admirable or annoying, walked right up to her.

This close, Konstanten could see that the effort had taken a toll on Kit. She listed to one side, and patches of her skin looked raw, like she'd spent too long in the sun. Her eyes glowed faintly with a film of eerie light, and a bit of blood had trickled out of her nose, and her breathing was harsh and ragged. It may have been a trick of too much hazy, unnatural light, but Konstanten thought that he saw faint traces of something like smoke clouding the pendant around her neck, even though it definitely wasn't.

"That was amazing, you know that?" Edér said, and he at least had the sense to pause and reach out cautiously first. "Folks up there are gonna be talking about it for years, I reckon. But I think they've had enough of a show for one day, and you look like you're about to burn up." He spoke in the same soft, steady way he did with the more skittish animals in that menagerie of theirs, a stream of words meant to calm, with his hands open and inviting but not touching.

Kit blinked. A hint of brown shone through in her eyes. "I..." she said, like she was dazed or drunk or contemplating some distant dream, "... the relief valve overheated. It was... it was fine before that."

"Not bad for a prototype," Edér said. It probably had something to do with the not-smoke at Kit's neck.

"We'll look at it later," Xoti said, moving slowly and carefully to stand next to Edér. "But I better take a look at those blisters first. I bet they hurt."

Kit took a wobbly step forward. "Yeah," she said faintly, and Edér was ready when she pitched forward.

"Oh, Gaun," Xoti said, her hands fluttering anxiously near Kit as Edér gathered the unconscious Watcher up and close. "Wasn't quite expecting all of this."

"We can fuss about it later," Edér muttered, his gaze settling beyond, and it was a testament to how long Konstanten had been away from the arena, that he'd taken his eyes away from the enemy still nearby.

But Fassina hadn't. She stood calmly at their head, grimoire open and glowing in her hands as if primed for casting, and she glared across the few meters that separated them from the elf and the godlike. The godlike leaned heavily on Dherys, and Dherys held her as steady and tight as Edér held on to Kit. But Dherys's eyes were on them, sharp and studying, and Konstanten noted, with grim satisfaction, that a missing earring had left a bloody hole in her ear, and one of her bracelets was cracked nearly to the point of falling apart.

"Go on," Fassina said, and Konstanten casually moved forward, hand on his mace, to augment the words. The other Resonants stood close behind their teammates, but they didn't move in turn. He didn't know if that was a good sign or a bad one. "Get out of here, unless you would rather the Faces be fed after all. I am certain they are disappointed and hungry, no?"

Maybe they should have been worried, with Kit out cold and unable to fight, with the light of the arena not quite so achingly bright, but there was something in Dherys's bruised face that didn't look intent on pushing the situation any further. Her eyes shifted to Edér -- to Kit -- and Edér's grip around the Watcher tightened, with more anger on his face than Konstanten had ever seen, as Xoti sidled over and put herself in front of them with an equally ferocious scowl.

Dherys huffed, a wry smile twisting her face. It was the kind of sneer that made Konstanten a little nervous. That made the bruises and broken jewelry seem inconsequential. He had a feeling that she could still take on most enemies here in the arena and win. But their side wasn't just any pack, even if they were down by a Watcher, and Konstanten's fingers hovered near the base of his mace.

"I'll be seeing you around," Dherys said, shifting her weight so that she could better support the godlike beside her, whose glare made for a stark contrast to her leader's smirk. "Take good care of her."

"Fuck off," Edér said, brusque and cold.

The dispassionate smile on Dherys's face only deepened as she looked between them, but she didn't retort or attack. She merely dipped her head in a mocking bow and gently pulled the godlike back with her. They were enfolded into the company of the two folk and the aumaua behind them, and then they were gone, out of the arena too quick and abrupt to follow, with a twist of perception that Konstanten knew enough to recognize as a cipher's work.


	3. Chapter 3

Konstanten had unearthed a rickety chair from somewhere within the depths of the temple, and it was Fassina's turn to claim it. She'd had Konstanten drag over one of the chests from their room as well, so that she had something to rest her feet on, and a book she'd snagged from Kit's cabin back on _The Fulcrum_ was propped up in her lap. It was primarily for show, because Fassina hadn't made it through more than a few pages, and at a glance, it was obvious that she was keeping watch. There was no other reason for the chair to be planted firmly in front of the entrance to their tiny room, for her grimoire to lay open on the chest beside her feet.

Other patrons of this abysmal excuse for quarters eyed her curiously as they came and went, but she arranged her face into a forbidding glower, and no one dared to approach. It did nothing to stop the gossip, and from the snatches of conversation that reached Fassina's ear, she gathered that no one had seen single combat between living kith in the arena in a long time. It had been even longer since the Faces had let a losing contender live.

It hadn't been Fassina's fight, but as wondering words drifted over to her, a smirk tugged at the corners of her mouth nonetheless. As much as she thought that this mentor of Kit's deserved far worse, Fassina didn't mind the looks being sent her way, artificial scowl aside. The Watcher was in the habit of making waves in the still waters of every place she visited, and it was occasionally pleasant to bask in that light.

When the mentor in question entered the lodgings, she -- unlike the rest of the patrons -- had no qualms about approaching, and Fassina did not allow herself to tense. The timing left much to be desired, as the others had gone to dinner, but perhaps that was the point.

Fassina was, for the most part, unconcerned. A quick summons would see the others returned, if need be, and she didn't think such a need would arise. Particularly when she glanced up from her book, taking her languid time, and saw that the elf woman was alone.

Dherys came to a stop before the chair and rested a hand on her hip, like Kit often did, and she stared down at Fassina like she didn't intend to make the first move. An easily recognizable tactic, but Fassina had no intention of getting drawn into a mind game.

"Di verus," Fassina said. She looked Dherys up and down and noted with satisfaction that exhaustion was apparent beneath her smug veneer, even though bruises had been healed in the interim. "You are a fool if you think that I will let you in."

A dry, unaffected smile crossed Dherys's face. It might have been intimidating, had Fassina not known better now. "You think I go about doing things because people _let_ me?"

"Oh, I am sure that you do not," Fassina said, and she snapped the book shut for emphasis. "But you will not force your way in, because you did not expect the Watcher to attack you. Now you are unsure of how far you can push her patience before she decides to kill you after all. She is quite capable of that, as you have seen, and she will not take it well if you continue to target those around her. And so you will not risk harming me in order to see her." Fassina arched an eyebrow at Dherys. "Please, inform me if I have gotten any details wrong."

As far as risk went, it was mild. There was always the possibility that Dherys could blow past, and there was no guarantee that Fassina would be able to shrug off the manipulation of a powerful cipher, though she had more tricks up her sleeve than were apparent at first glance. But Fassina had little doubt that she was correct. They'd all seen the fight, and there was no reason for Dherys to dally here by herself, unless she was reluctant to push forward.

Dherys's smile flickered, as if Fassina's words had cut through a few of the threads holding it in place. "How is she?" Dherys asked, her voice no less calm and assured as she paid no mind to Fassina's theory.

Fassina let out a disbelieving laugh. She tucked the book against her thigh and folded one leg on top of the other, where they rested on the chest at her feet. "You have no right to that information, aimica." She smiled, small and tight. "But you are free to pull it out of my mind, if you are feeling bold."

Dherys considered it. Fassina could see that clearly on the woman’s face, and she couldn't lie to herself: the possibility made her insides curl. But Fassina remained relaxed in the chair, leaning back with her feet up, because she was in no mood to indulge this woman's toying. It was one thing if she was a serious threat, but it had become abundantly clear that too much held her back, when she wanted things from her protege yet.

"I have more right than you," Dherys said. "What are you? Her pet wizard?"

"One of two," Fassina said smoothly. "Though as of late, I have been dabbling in druidic practice as well. The casità considers me a research partner, and it is useful for the line of study that she pursues." She tilted her head, a mockingly thoughtful movement. "But you are well aware of that, no?"

Fassina was aware of how close she was treading to poking an angry dragon, but it was worth it, to draw a reaction out of this woman. Dherys's eyes narrowed, in the moment before her expression smoothed out.

"Not enough, is it, though?" Dherys said, as unconcerned as ever. "If she came seeking me out."

Fassina laughed again. "If you were that important," she said, "she would not have allowed herself the opportunity to kill you. Consider yourself lucky that she spared you."

Dherys's eyes flicked up, towards the room. It had no door, but Fassina's chair and chest were positioned so that no one could get close enough to get a proper glimpse in. "It should have swallowed her, before she spared me," Dherys said. Fassina had to admit, the concern looked entirely genuine. That did not mean that it wasn't another tactic as well. "Do you really know what you're dealing with?" Dherys's eyes bored into Fassina's. "Has she woken up since?"

"I know more than you, aimica," Fassina said, just as cool, even though her stomach turned with the words. Kit hadn't, and there was no stopping Dherys from knowing the answer to her question. The woman's face grew a shade darker. "And she is in far better hands than yours," Fassina added, with a dismissive shrug. "You will have to wait."

Perhaps the concern was genuine, because something in Dherys's stance shifted. It made Fassina's shoulders go rigid, made her eyes flick to the grimoire at her feet, and she was a breath or two away from snatching the book up, when a voice came from behind her.

"I've been awake for a while, actually."

The tension uncoiled within Fassina as quickly as it had wound up. She didn't care that Dherys saw her shoulders drop with relief, and she didn't particularly care that she took her eyes off of the woman, when she twisted in the chair. "And you did not think to inform me?" she demanded. "Merla, I have started growing gray hairs because of you."

Kit stopped in the doorway. She had shadows under her eyes and a worrisome tinge to her skin, but she stood upright and smiled at Fassina. "Sorry," she said. "Needed to gather my thoughts."

She locked eyes with her mentor, and her smile curled back into something vicious, in contrast to the artificially smooth expression on Dherys's face. Fassina stood, pushing the chair to the side and moving with it. She did not remove herself entirely from Kit's side, but she had no desire to drown in the water-thick tension in the air.

"Are you alright?" Dherys asked.

"Fuck you," Kit said.

Dherys rolled her eyes. "Can we talk?" she asked, unperturbed, jerking her head towards the rest of the temple.

Fassina let a long sigh roll out when Kit's gazed shifted to her, her expression somewhere between set and apologetic. "I cannot advise in favor of that," Fassina said, but she knew her words would go unheeded. Kit was typically good at taking advice into consideration, except for when she wasn't. "Your farmer will bite my head off."

"Just tell him I didn't listen," Kit said, only a little contrite.

"Hmph," Fassina said. It would take more convincing than that, when it had required considerable effort to send him and Xoti to dinner earlier. But if Kit wanted to be alone with this detestable woman, then Fassina would do her best to fend the others off. She knew a surrender when she saw one, and she knew that Dherys would not try her protege's patience again. "That is no doubt how it would go, were we to argue about it. Very well." There was little point in wasting time on a dispute that could not be won. She bent to scoop up her grimoire and snapped it shut in Dherys's face as she straightened. "The Watcher is kinder than me. I would not test that, if I were you."

With an eyebrow arched and amusement taking the place of smooth indifference, Dherys tilted her head in Kit's direction. "You've got quite a few loyal pets, don't you?"

Kit moved, and even Fassina didn't expect it. This time, Dherys was more ready for it than she had been in the arena, but only just. The dagger ended up caught between them, more so because Kit hadn't really been trying to land a blow, than because Dherys's hand had latched onto Kit's wrist.

"She told you not to test it," Kit said, hand and dagger perfectly steady.

Dherys smiled thinly and released her wrist. "Then I won't."

As Kit shoved the dagger back into her belt, Fassina stepped close and brushed a hand against her arm, a silent offer of reinforcement. But Kit only gave an imperceptible shake of her head and said, "I'll be back soon," then gestured for Dherys to lead the way. _Thank you,_ a quieter voice said, drifting carefully into Fassina's thoughts.

Fassina hummed and sent a look in Kit's direction. It could not convey meaning in a way that a cipher could, but the message was clear: Kit would owe her some better books after this. Fassina assumed that the message was received, as Kit offered a sheepish grimace.

When they left, Fassina considered making her way to the mess hall, but Konstanten had already promised to return with food for her, and she didn't particularly feel like confronting the farmer and the priest right about now. So she settled down in the chair and picked up the book once more. Now that Kit was awake, the words absorbed her attention, and Fassina was able to lose herself between the pages, mediocre quality of the tome aside.

* * *

They left the Temple for the surrounding jungle and followed a narrow path worn dirt-brown with animal passage, striped with shadows and fading sunlight. Kith feet had not tread here often and had left little lingering trace for a cipher's senses to track. The path lead to nowhere in particular, where kith were concerned, but it ran alongside pulsing rhythms below the ground, one that animals followed instinctively, when trees and soil grew richer for what lay beneath.

The unrest of Kazuwari did not retreat entirely at first, echoing hollowly through the growth of veins beneath. It itched like a wound underneath Kit's skin, but it was not quite so loud, so present, the further their steps took them from the Temple. It wouldn't be, when the living stone beneath them grew concentrated and centered in a pattern of concentric and interlocking whorls and spokes, in orbit around the land where the Temple had been built, around the veins there. When it was no longer as living as it had once been.

It was too quiet, actually, and that was why they were out here. Nevertheless, Kit couldn't settle, like the itch beneath her skin could not be scratched. She didn't want to be the first to break the silence, but impatience blossomed, fast-growing and agitated.

"Why are you here?" Kit asked at last, sighing with it.

Dherys smiled, in the corner of Kit's eye. She walked unhurried, studying the trees they passed like there was something uniquely interesting about them. "I didn't know how _thoroughly_ the Leaden Key represented the gods' collective interests until recently," Dherys said. Until she'd pulled it out of Aloth's head, that is, and Kit swallowed back the sharpness on her tongue. She wasn't here to get drawn into an argument. "Galawain let assassins come after me," Dherys continued, and though her smile remained, it turned bitter and vicious, "for the crime of _seeking_." She shrugged, as if it was only a mild concern. "I want to cause him as much inconvenience as possible. Didn't expect you to show up, but now that you're here..."

"I don't care about your grudge," Kit cut in, brushing a drooping branch out of the way.

"But I'm not the only one with a grudge, am I?" Dherys asked, and as she stepped nimbly around the underbrush that crowded the path, her cold blue eyes swept sideways and over Kit, assessing, before something bright and hungry entered her gaze. "We were _right_ , Nadia. That's the only reason the gods would want me dead for it."

"That's not my name," Kit said, stone-faced. She stared out at the curve of the faint path, at the dirt and foliage illuminated by shafts of deep sunlight piercing through the canopy and the surrounding maze of trees. The air hummed faintly with the endless rush of tide and crashing waves, inescapable in all corners of Kazuwari.

Dherys was searching for something else, some reaction in Kit's face. Kit didn't give it to her, didn't glance in her direction, and Dherys didn't let any impatience shine through her face or thoughts. "Luscieta was too big of a name for you, then?"

It was only an attempt to crack the wall that Kit had put up, and Kit didn't let herself bite. "Too many letters," she agreed. Too old, more like. But it was her turn to shrug, savoring her next words. "And I already know we were right."

Dherys's calm was artificial, now, the hunger tucked away behind it. She couldn't quite keep it from trickling out, though, a soft thrum of yearning against Kit's senses. "Let me guess," Dherys said. "Your pet god told you?"

Silence hung heavy in the air, fleeting and yet stretched and strained, before Kit smiled. Kazuwari's metaphysical turmoil was fainter still, its echo in the veins beneath nearly vanished, even to a practiced ear. But she didn't need to hear an absent flow of souls to know where the arching adra had grown up beneath the soil. The trees and animal tracks were indication enough. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

The words cut deep, the knowledge dangled just out reach like a taunting prize. Kit could feel it, even when Dherys was trying to hide it. Her mentor went rigid in the corner of Kit's eye, before Dherys forced herself to relax once more. She rolled her shoulders and cracked a few knuckles, like she was getting ready for exercises or a fight. "Your ship's close, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Kit said, cold, "and what do you think's going to happen, if you go near it?"

She didn't need to clarify. The arena battle was fresh in her thoughts, a blazing power rippling through her essence and bending the world around her. Xoti had healed the worst of the wounds that had resulted, the raw sunburned skin and the bleeding. Kit didn't know if those injuries were only a natural progression of burgeoning power, or the result of attempting to mitigate the divine influence now permanently welded to her essence. If the effects had rebounded on her physical form, in her attempt to metaphysically contain them. Some deeper ache lingered even now, whisper-quiet but not gone.

But Kit would sustain a lot worse, if it meant keeping her mentor in line.

Dherys's face darkened with something that she didn't hide, as she came to a full stop in the middle of the path, and Kit was forced to halt after a few paces and turn. "It's not safe," Dherys said, oddly urgent. Her gaze was fixed and piercing, her pale blue eyes bright even in the shadows of the canopy. "You don't know the first thing about what you're dealing with, and you're using yourself as a test subject..."

"You had _no_ problem using me as a test subject for, oh," Kit said, scathing, "a decade and a half, I think it was?"

"I never put your soul in danger," Dherys said, vehement. "All I did was help you control the power you'd ended up with. You _know_ how the adra in the Lands affected you. What do you think's going to happen, if you tangle with a god?"

"I already have!" Kit snapped, and she didn't know why she was suddenly so blisteringly angry. Why the worry in Dherys's voice got under her skin more effectively than any underhanded jabs. "It's _already_ affected me!"

She stalked forward, then, across the striped shadows and sunlight, until she was in her mentor's face. Her pendant was ruined yet again, but she'd cultivated enough of her own focus over years of practice that she had a deep well even without it, and essence coiled up the length of her arms, ready. Her ears roared like the ocean's waves in the distance, and when she shoved her mentor against the nearest tree, Dherys didn't stop her.

"So I am going to see where it takes me," Kit said, her hands coiled into Dherys's coat, "and I am going to use every tool at my disposal to do that. And if you go anywhere near my people, my ship, my daughter, my _pet god_... I will put you in the fucking ground." She let go of her mentor's shoulders, breathing hard but steady. "Are we clear?"

Dherys didn't move. She was a little taller, a little more composed, with her head cocked down to hold Kit's gaze, but she kept her stillness, her eyes cold. She knew just how serious the threat was. Kit had made no effort to conceal the feeling behind it. "Perfectly," Dherys said.

Kit let loose a long breath. She stepped back onto the path, no longer squaring up in her mentor's face, but she didn't retreat. "I don't want your concern," Kit said. "I don't want your opinions. I want you to fucking _think,_ for one second, about what you're doing. Were you planning on, what, destroying this place?"

Dherys stared at her, unreadable in face and feeling, thoughts expertly locked down behind the featureless hum of essence held in careful equilibrium. Kit was crowded in close enough that Dherys had to sidle around to keep walking, but she did so, and Kit didn't stop her. "I'd considered it," Dherys said lightly as she shoved past, and Kit had to turn and follow to keep up.

The path widened and grew more defined. It meant more animal traffic, which meant that they were near the point where the adra growths shot upward one last time at the edge of their orbiting whorl-pattern, close to the surface and yet not quite breaching, before dropping off so steeply into the depths of the planet that they could no longer impact the surface. They were close, and yet she couldn't feel it any lingering imprint at the edges of her senses, could only see it in the shape and nature of the animal path. Strange.

"Galawain is running scared," Kit said. "You think he's going to take it _well_ , if you piss him off?"

Dherys smiled again, as if there was something amusing in the question. "Your concern for me is touching," she said, and Kit rolled her eyes, "but you're overestimating his ability to retaliate against me. Especially now. Nothing's managed to kill me yet."

"You, maybe," Kit said, and she had to concede the point there. "But the Beyond isn't entirely cut off. I know that much. What about Ascdala?"

Dherys came to a full stop again, and so did Kit. Her mentor stood with every muscle tense and frozen, like something cornered, like something about to pounce, until she turned and regarded Kit with a cool expression, one that was visibly painted over a sudden agitation. "What are you talking about?"

Kit grimaced. As refreshing as it was to hold things over her mentor's head for a change, she didn't relish this. "Let's just say the godlike are a fuel source."

Dherys actually blanched, her face drawing tight and pale with shock. She stared at Kit, eyes wide as other things trickled between their thoughts, the extent that Kit would allow, before Dherys's gaze dropped away, fixing on some point in the tangle of trees around them. A smile worked its way back onto her face, but it was arranged in the shape of a snarl. "I'm going to fucking kill him."

"Get in line," Kit said, and she kept walking. This time, her mentor had to keep up. "I need you to wait," Kit continued, stepping around a particularly gnarled sprawl of underbrush. "Let me figure out what's going on with this place." She could feel it, when Dherys went to speak, but Kit cut her off quickly. "I'm not asking. I'm not giving you a choice. You're going to step back and let me handle this, because it's not like you stand a chance in Hel of making headway like I can."

It was a visible effort, for Dherys to swallow her pride. But Kit waited and watched out of the corner of her eye, silent and stone-faced again, and at last, Dherys sighed and nodded assent. She studied Kit like one might study a variable of particular interest, but there was something almost wistful, in her expression. "What's it like?" Dherys asked, not quite conceding the point out loud. "Being a Watcher?"

There was so much that Dherys didn't yet know. Just how right they'd been, about what lay at the heart of Eora... and just how wrong. Just how difficult it would be to make any headway, beyond proving that Eora had once housed an impossible soul. But it felt good, Kit thought, to hold the cards this time. To have the knowledge that her mentor wanted, and to choose when and how she shared it. "Ask me again," Kit said, and she let that satisfaction bleed out of her, this time, "when I'm in a better mood."

For a moment, something dark and angry flashed across Dherys's face, something that left Kit with hackles raised and muscles tensed, before Dherys rolled her eyes. She huffed, a derisive sound, but there was an edge to her smile that wasn't quite angry. "I shouldn't expect any less from my student, eh?" Dherys asked.

It was just another jab, small but expertly aimed. Kit bristled all the same, and she didn't think she was altogether successful at hiding it, at keeping her essence from rippling with it. She quickened her pace, pulling determinedly ahead of her mentor, but it was only a few seconds before she very nearly stumbled into what they'd been searching for.

Dherys's hand on her shoulder pulled her back from the crumbling edge where the ground fell away. It was quiet here, devoid of animal life, of soul whisper and soul trace both, and so there'd been no warning at all, with tangled snarls of underbrush hiding the drop-off. Even the distant ocean was muffled to the point of non-existence, as if some impossibly deep stillness had fallen over the land.

The ground here had caved in. The unnatural basin now sunken into the land formed a deep, gaping circle, the opposite edge of which stood shadowed by jungle in the distance. The sloping mess of soil and rock beneath held still, brackish water at its lowest point, many, many meters below. A fall from that height would kill a normal person.

From here, Kit couldn't even tell what had happened to the stream that must have left the water behind. This had likely been a watering hole once, she thought, that had nurtured some of Kazuwari's stranger and stronger creatures. The arena had fed the veins beneath, which had fed and were fed by the Wheel's eternal turn, and the veins had fed the land and the denizens and the climate under which they grew... and not always in expected ways. It was the same everywhere they could be found, to varying degrees.

But something underneath had collapsed.

"Well," Dherys said mildly, "fuck me."

"Have you seen anything like this?" Kit asked. She couldn't recall anything of the sort, in the Living Lands or the Dyrwood or even here.

"An outer ring entirely caved in?" Dherys said. "Not quite." She tilted her head, a sign of deep thought. "Must have shattered or crumbled completely. It wouldn't be this big if there was any structure left beneath." She gave Kit a long sideways glance. "Think it's because of whatever's stopped up the flow here?"

The tone was one of instruction and teaching, and Kit pushed down her instant annoyance at the sound of it. She frowned down at the basin instead, at the pool of still water far below, considering the shape, the knowledge she had. "No," she said. Their voices echoed slightly here, rebounding back from the walls of the basin. "I think we'll find shit like this everywhere."

She didn't mean for the _we_ to slip out, and irritation congealed thicker, bitter at the back of her throat.

"One question answered," Dherys murmured, and Kit didn't think she'd even noticed the shift in mood, lost as she was in contemplation, "and a hundred more laid bare." A smile curled up at the corners of her mouth again, delighted and hungry. "This might be the most interesting problem that's ever crossed my path."

Kit kept an iron hold on her thoughts, because she didn't want Dherys to know how much she agreed with the sentiment, against her better judgment. More information could probably be gleaned from this area, but it would be late evening soon, and she'd spent long enough away from her friends. She'd gotten the threat across to her mentor, which had been the point. She could come back later, with instruments in tow, after the problem of this island's odd metaphysical qualities had been solved and offered less contamination of evidence.

So Kit turned on her heel and made her way back up the path without another word, and after a moment, she heard her mentor's footsteps and begrudging presence follow.


End file.
